Robots in Hospitals

Dieppe writes "Robot couriers are being used in hospitals CNN. The robots are being used as delivery 'bots to deliver medicine and other hospital supplies. They are polite, and even can be overly cautious. I wonder if at night they supply them with saws, arms and other cutting devices and let them at each other? Turns out they're cost effective as well!"

Comments

Let's Make a Movie! Yow!

[ackthpt]

Oh, yeah. I can just see the original thinkers at Hollywood, Inc. making a movie about these. Robots, designed to serve and help mankind, a minor flaw, they think for themselves and start taking out the patients systematically until some tough macho cop, probably played by a typecast actor shows up and swaggers a lot and blows them apart with the kind of gun only SWAT teams and infantry are issued, all the while uttering expletives which only entertain juveniles. They'll probably rip off the title of some great sci-fi classic, too, just to promote the lousy thing.

There was a comic I won at a school fair in the late 60's, with cover ripped off (probably return donated by distributor) Magnus Robot Fighter, which would fit the bill rather well.

Speaking Of Crappy Movies

[lickalotapus]

Uh, I think we all know what happens next.

And...?

[ResidntGeek]

Robots are also being used in delicate surgeries, to ease hand tremors by the surgeon. They use various methods of control, but the basic idea is the doctor is in a different room and the robot in the operating room, weilding the scalpel, clamps, camera, etc.

Re:And...?

[ResidntGeek]

Yes, then the roobt detects the hand tremors and removes them, so that the doctor doesn't accidentally slice open an artery or whatever. I *think* it's called the Da Vinci Surgical System.

Re:And...?

[stratjakt]

Not only that, but it can magnify the image, and reduce the doctors movements.

That is, the doctor can do virtual surgery on a heart thats blown up to appear to him to be six feet across. He removes/cuts/does whatever to a managable six inch chunk of it, and the robot replicates that on the real heart, in sub-millimeter fashion.

Pretty cool stuff. Still very much in development though, but there have been some early trials.

Re:And...?

[CFBMoo1]

Here's a link to my old colleges CS department. They have surgical simulators with force feedback in the works when I was graduating. I did some minor work on the lumbar puncture simulator for a final semester project. Was really fun stuff.

Millersville University's Research in Haptics and Surgical Simulation

.oO

[Joe the Lesser]

Doctor: Scalpel.

Robot: Scalpel.

Doctor: Domo arigato, Nurse Roboto.

RoboDoc

[yanestra]

In Germany, an US product called RoboDoc was working for several years doing pre-programmed hip joint operations. Several hundreds of victims are now preparing to sue the hospitals - the ensanguined operations have led to severe destructions in nerves, muscles and bones.

Technology in hospitals

[DoctorDeath]

My mother (an RN) was recently complaining about the hospital she works in going to using computers in place of paper to do all the patient reports. She had a fit when I told her the local hospitals are using laptops and scanners in every room and medicines are kept lockedup until the nurse scans the patient ID. After the computer verifies the patient it then unlocks the proper drawer so the nurse can get the proper medicine. Now this comes along and she will end up in a nut house for sure.

Robo-sourcing?

[manabadman]

University of Virginia Hospital could save as much as $218,000 a year if it replaced 15 human couriers with six HelpMate robots, which would pay for themselves in little over three years.

Its not just IT workers that are in danger, and its not just Indian workers that are taking away jobs.

But thats just how the world works. Invention brings about efficiency but it also opens new avenues for humans. After all H. Ford's assembly line has created a net gain in jobs, right?

I for one welcome our new ... bah, hello nurse :)

This is news?

[demonlapin]

We've had one in my med school for, oh, four or five years. They even ginned up an ID badge for him, which necessitated a naming contest (the winning entry was "Rudy").

Works just like the article says - takes drugs from the pharmacy to the floor. Fairly straightforward, really. I'm honestly surprised there aren't more in use - most hospitals (of any real size - I'm not counting all the rural 30- and 40-bed hospitals) use a pneumatic tube system of some sort to deliver meds to the floors, and those are notoriously difficult and expensive to maintain.

Shh!!

[sserendipity]

>I wonder if at night they supply them with saws,
>arms and other cutting devices and let them at each
>other? Turns out they're cost effective as well!

The first rule of Robot Club is _no_ talking about Robot Club.

I was kidnapped by one of those Robots!

[blaberski]

Well, sort of anyway. I work in alot of hospitals all around the country. Anyway, at one of the hospitals, I get in the elivator on the first floor, push the button for the 3rd floor and the door closed.

The elivator stops on the second floor and one of these robots get in. It took what seemed like forever for it to get in the elivator and get turned around. Once it had turned the right way in the elivator it then proceeded to make a bunch of tones.

The doors closed, and the elivator began to move, it then bypassed my floor went all the way to the 8th floor. Where it got out and left me standing their.

Apparently at this hospital the robots have priority on all elivator trafic. It simply overrode my selection and put in its own.

Damn Robots.